Just watched this and spent most of the last half hour weeping. The scenes with Hall and his pregnant wife…. you’d have to be made of fucking stone not to tear up.

I never saw Everest when it was first released, I don’t know why. But this is a seriously moving film. It never strays into worthiness or hagiography, opting instead for an almost documentary feel. I deliberately didn’t look up the true story it’s based on beforehand because I didn’t want the ending spoiled. So, when it did come, I had no idea who would make it off the mountain or not. And I did keep hoping, ridiculously, that they would all make it.

When it comes… oh god.

What makes it worse is that I watched the iTunes Extras which features interviews with the bereaved relatives including a daughter who never got to meet her father. Again, I dare you to watch that without dehydrating yourself through crying.

The heart of this film and the respect it pays to the real human lives it portrays is very rare. Add that to the wonderful acting, script and visual effects and you have one hell of a film, one that I know I’ll be coming back to in the future.

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Mass job losses caused by advancing technology could lead to a rise of Marxism, the governor of the Bank of England has warned. Mark Carney said the automation of millions of jobs could lead to mass unemployment, wage stagnation and the growth of communism within a generation.

He warned “Marx and Engels may again become relevant.” Speaking at the Canada Growth Summit, Mr Carney said increases in artificial intelligence, big data and high-tech machines could create huge inequalities between the high-skill

The irony of a leading prop of capitalism predicting a resurgence in Marxism is… pretty sweet, actually!

While great swathes of the labour movement ignore Marx’ valuable analysis of capitalism or write it off as being an anachronism, Carney can see it for what it is: a rigorous theoretical perspective on society and its economic foundations.

There is no doubt the coming quantum leap in artificial intelligence will affect huge swathes of the working class. Not just the traditional blue collar worker, long the victim of increased automation and robotics but what most non-Marxists regard as “middle class” labour. AI will displace millions of jobs in offices, call centres, retail…

Will we use AI and robotics to finally free humanity from dangerous, oppressive jobs and create a surplus for us all, a surplus that is part and parcel of communism.

Jobless millions ~ what will they do? Will they receive a Basic Income regardless of labour because robots are doing… well… everything?

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All Empires are evil. The British Empire was one of the most evil in history. Never forget.

“In 1600, when the East India Company was founded, Britain was generating 1.8 percent of the world’s GDP while India was producing 22.5 percent.

By 1870, at the peak of the Raj, Britain was generating 9.1 percent, while India had been reduced to a poor third-world nation with just 12.2 percent, a symbol across the globe of famine and deprivation.”